“France’s Tobis Studios sued Charles Chaplin for plagiarizing the conveyor belt sequence [in Modern Times] from René Clair’s À nous la liberté (1931) but dropped the suit when Clair declared himself honored by the tribute, saying, ‘I have certainly borrowed enough from him.'”
–Source: Internet Movie Database
Jean Harrington: You know Charles?
Sir Alfred McGlennan Keith: Oh, is he the tall backwards boy always toying with toads and things? Yes, I think I have seen him skulking about.
Jean Harrington: He’s not backwards. He’s a scientist.
Sir Alfred McGlennan Keith: Oh is that what it is? I knew he was, mm… peculiar.
— Dialogue from The Lady Eve (1941)